It was an illustrious beginning, but it's all down hill from there.
About twenty hashers gathered for a chalk talk, where Witty confused everyone by insisting that three vertical dots are also perpendicular to trail, since trail is a line and there's a whole plane that's perpendicular... lots of booing and covering of ears at this highfalutin geometry stuff. The hares finally escaped around a corner of a building.
At 7:23 (or so) the pack took off. Somebody in the pack want to comment on trail?
The good part was, trail soon veered off the pavement to a little path, leading to a quaint wooden bridge, and from there down into the creek. The creek teemed with aquatic life. The hares had promised the pack a special prize for catching a crawfish. Just Randy caught a good one, not really big but squirmy. Madam Yuk and Norman Bates made a team effort, and they managed to snag a dead, larval crawfish. Then they smashed it flat before the end of trail. I'm not sure that counts, guys.
The creek went on and on, under two roads, where lots of the cheating pack exitted and zenned to the... wait, what happened to the beer stop?
It was supposed to be a beer stop, but just as the beer pulled up and the first hare dragged herself out of the creek, an unmarked Town and Country police car arrived. Here's where it gets interesting. Its seems that one of the hares (Major Penetration) aroused the suspicions of an area resident the day before while scouting trail. The resident stopped MP, who was wandering around with a map and looking troublesome. Upon learning that MP planned to return with more people the next day, the concerned resident phoned the police. The nice officer who spoke to us told us there were ten cop cars out around the neighborhood and they were fixing to bring in the helicopter.
All this just for one tall, thin, blue-eyed, receding-harelined hasher? It seems that Major Penetration (completely by coincidence of course) matches the description of the burglar who has been robbing big houses in Des Peres and Ladue lately. They really thought it was he. Of course, once MP finished setting all the blow jobs and dragged into the beer stop, he and the officer had a good chat about Desert Storm and other military operations they were both involved in, and all seemed well.
But all was not well, because we never did get our beer. The hares left in a panic, and the crazy pack gave them about ten seconds' head start. Eep, quick, PMS, stop the beer truck! Give them beers to run with, something -- distract them, quick!
The hares fled around the curve and into the woods. They found Duzzy waiting for them on the other side. Cheater! He ran trail backwards before it was even laid. Never trust a hasher, especially one with 192 runs.
Trail continued down a small cliff and along a cool ledge on the retaining wall next to Manchester. Then it went down a ditch full of big rocks and into the quarry. 'Course, the darn pack skipped all this fun part. The hares sprinted the last bit to the on-in and only escaped because the pack saw the cars and headed there... which was not the end of trail. Once the beer truck (PMS) found its way to the end (with lots of yelling and directions from other hashers), we circled up underneath Manchester, in an unused corner of the Des Peres Cinema parking lot.
Partway through circle, it was altogether too quiet and respectful, and we noted the absence of Whiney Bitch. Imagine our great relief when we turned to see him running across the parking lot. We yelled enthusiastically and he joined us eventually. He even ran trail after arriving at 8:00. Hurray for WB!
There were lots of down-downs. How do 20 hashers, with no beer stops, go through four cases of beer and still want more? Amazing, I tell you. let's see, who all drank?
Finally, it's time for the on-after! They didn't want to listen to the directions, but eventually they got hungry enough. (Another announcement: Madam Yuk needs help moving the weekend of the 16th if you're available.) The pack moved to Down Under Restaurant & Pub, half a mile and six lane changes away. The waitresses were thrilled to see us. They served us pitchers and good food and lots of water (whew, we needed that). Yum-eee. Lizzardo showed up, and we saw that he really has hurt his knee. It is not that he fears being DFL; it is that he can barely walk. Wish him luck with his surgery on Friday. Lizzardo, Just Adam, and Jake Off practiced competitive down-downing. The hashers slowly trickled out, and everyone got home before midnight (wow, that was a short trail).